Here is my proposal for making rail transit cheaper
Rails by themselves are actually quite cheap - anywhere from 1 - 2 million dollars a mile. Monorails are generally cheaper than heavy rail, due to less complicated elevated structures.
Electrification can be anywhere from 5 - 10 million dollars mile for overhead wire and 1 - 5 million dollars mile for third rail.
The biggest costs by far are land acquisition, tunneling, bridges, elevated sections and viaducts. Eliminating at grade crossings and either moving roads underground or rerouting them can also be expensive, but this is rarely done
My solution to this is to use narrow gauge tracks. I would use a 3 foot 6 inch gauge, because this gauge is farely common. 3 feet 6 inches is roughly 25% narrower than standard gauge. This narrowness would enable smaller Bridges as well as tunnels. Narrower gauges also enable using tighter and sharper turns; this makes it ideal for building along freeways. Many suggest the idea of building rail systems along freeways, but freeways often have sharp turns. A narrow gauge railway enable using the curved and sharper rows of freeways, reducing land acquisition cost. Where tunneling is needed you could use smaller tunnels, the New York and Bart Subway tunnels are roughly 17 feet in diameter, the London tube is roughly 12 feet in diameter. Boring company tunnels are roughly 12 feet in diameter, but their utility is limited by the fact that can only use cars and thus have a limited capacity 1000 - 4000 passenger per hour. You could take these tunnels and put some narrow gauge railways in them and exponentially increase their usefulness.
Finally the vehicles would be similar to PCC, albeit with a more up to date design. A PCC car is quite efficient and uses less weight to move a passenger than modern light rail vehicles do. A narrow gauge PCC car seats 47 passengers and weighs 37,990 pounds, this 808 pounds per seated passenger. A Siemens p2000 weighs 98,000 pounds and has 76 seats, this roughly 1289 pounds per seated passenger.
Sources on vehicle weight
https://www.streetcar.org/streetcars/1052-1052-los-angeles-railway/
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Siemens_P2000
The vehicles would be roughly 45 - 50 foot for 45 - 50 passengers and now more than 9 feet wide and 10 feet tall. Modern light rail vehicles tend to be at least 12 feet tall and some are even taller. This use of smaller vehicles allows flexibility to respond to demand. You could use one vehicle when demand is low or hook more together when demand is high. By using longer vehicles in modern LRV systems you make them less flexible in responding to demand, when demand is low, load factors dramatically decrease. This would reduce operation cost, maintenance and increase load factors. By using more weight efficient vehicles you reduce material and maintenance costs and reduce track maintenance costs.
Railroad to Freedom
Small radius curves do not require a narrow gauge. Most North American streetcar systems used standard gauge and negotiated turns on intersections with no problem. The Chicago Transit Authority rapid transit system is known for its tight radius curves and it uses standard gauge.
no real advantage for narrow-gauge, because expenses are tied to the actual width and height of the rolling-stock.
Thinner passenger equuipment meanscarried and cincreases per-passenger costs.
Note that both passenger and freight equipment on South African Railways, 3'-6" gauge, is wider than on British Rail, 4'-8-1/2" gauge.
Our community is FREE to join. To participate you must either login or register for an account.